Heave Ho Herman

PART 3

As we continued down river into the darkness we had pretty much fallen into a routine which propelled us on to our goal of St. Charles . Tonight our goal was Herman and as we paddled out of Callaway County one of the old jodies from our river travels with the Discovery Expedition of St. Charles came to mind:

Oh the Callaway women ain’t got no combs
Haul away, haul away
They comb their hair with catfish bones.
And we’re bound away to Louisiana.

Of course we were bound for Herman at the time so we gave a Heave Ho and made some of the best time we had since beginning the journey. We also came to the realization that no one had passed us since we left Glasgow which seemed like a long time ago and that we were passing every canoe in sight. Granted the fastest were so far ahead of us that some were actually done by now and others were so far ahead we would never see them until we reached to final destination but at this point we were the best of the worst. This trend continued for the rest of the journey.

A couple of times during the night we caught up with others who were traveling by moonlight. It is a common practice to band together during darkness to help each other identify any possible dangers as a group. For Chad and I the pace was too slow and every time we caught up with a group we would become impatient and take off on our own.

This may have been my favorite segment of the trip. We knew we were going to finish and now what had began as a race had evolved into an adventure. There are 300 some million souls in the United States of America and we were part of a very small elite group out on the Missouri River in a tiny boat communing with nature in all of her glory while the rest of America was sleeping. It was very quiet except for the occasional splash of one of our paddles or a low flying aircraft. It was one of those moments when if talking became necessary one would talk in whispers (or at least those that hear well would). With Chad, now a father of a son and a daughter to soon make her appearance we had conservations as equals dad to dad not as father and son about the hopes we had for our children. We also talked about our spiritually and beliefs. No doubt, in any other environment conversations we would have never had.

Even when we were in the darkest part of the river we could still see anything that seemed out of place on the water but we were having difficulty finding the channel markers which are reflective and show up very well when a spot light is pointed at them. However, our light was loosing its charge and we were limited to using it only for brief moments until it eventually died. Even without the light we managed to navigate very well by referring to the GPS.

Soon we could see the bridge over the Missouri River at Herman and from landing there with the Discovery Expedition I knew the Herman checkpoint would be just past the bridge. We made our landing at the Herman boat ramp at 1:41am and found our tent which Jeff had set up for us and we lay down there next to the train tracks to take a nap in spite of the trains. Our plan was to be back on the river before daylight for the final dash. If I would have known what the next day had in store for us I might have passed on the nap at Herman and insisted that we proceed on into the night.

When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee.... Isaiah 43:2a KJV